Updated — Oct. 13, 7:36 a.m. ET
Frenchman Jean Tirole has won the 2014 Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel, it has been announced.
61 years old, French Jean Tirole @UT1Capitole, 1/1 #nobelprize2014 in Economic Sciences
Tirole, 61, of Toulouse 1 Capitole University, France, won the prize "for his analysis of market power and regulation."
He becomes the third French Nobel economics laureate, and the 50th French laureate in all categories.
#NobelFacts Jean Tirole @UT1Capitole is the 50th Laureate born in France (all Prize categories.)
A statement from the Nobel committee said: "Jean Tirole is one of the most influential economists of our time. He has made important theoretical research contributions in a number of areas, but most of all he has clarified how to understand and regulate industries with a few powerful firms.
"Many industries are dominated by a small number of large firms or a single monopoly. Left unregulated, such markets often produce socially undesirable results – prices higher than those motivated by costs, or unproductive firms that survive by blocking the entry of new and more productive ones.
"From the mid-1980s and onwards, Jean Tirole has breathed new life into research on such market failures. His analysis of firms with market power provides a unified theory with a strong bearing on central policy questions: how should the government deal with mergers or cartels, and how should it regulate monopolies?"
You can watch the announcement here:
